Surname:

Panse

First name:

Friedrich Albert

Era:

20th century

Field of expertise:

Psychiatry

Place of birth:

Essen

* 30.03.1899

† 06.12.1973

Biography print

German psychiatrist, expert consultant for the Nazi euthanasia programme “Action T4”

 

Friedrich Albert Panse (1899–1973) was born into a Protestant family in Essen. His father, a trained machinist, worked as a foreman at the local Krupp factory. Upon completing his school education in 1917, Panse served as an artillerist in WW1. He studied medicine in Münster and Berlin from 1919 to 1923 and obtained his doctorate as well as his medical license in 1924. In May 1924, he assumed a post as a junior physician at the municipal mental hospital in Berlin-Wittenau, where he was later promoted to resident physician and eventually to senior physician. In the same year, Panse married his wife, Louise (née Klapdor), in an interdenominational marriage. Their daughter, Sigrid, was born in 1927 (cf. Forsbach 2012; Forsbach 2006: 213 ff.; Heyll 1997).

 

Expert on “war neurosis”

After WW1, Panse made himself a name as an expert in assessing traumatised soldiers, many of whom he accused of fraudulently obtaining state benefits by simulating mental problems. In 1925, for instance, he claimed that 23% of so-called “war neurotics” had drifted into a criminal environment. He published articles in the journals Deutsche Zeitschrift für Nervenheilkunde and Archiv für Psychiatrie in which he presented single-case studies underlining his idea of a general connection between “war neurosis”, fraud and the existence of a veteran benefit system (Panse 1925: 232 ff.; 1926: 61 ff.). In his opinion, traumatised soldiers should not be entitled to benefits since their suffering was typically the result of their “constitutional inferiority” (Rauh & Prüll 2015; on Panse’s radicalisation as an expert on “war neurosis”, see Roth 1999: 8–75, 39 f., 42).

 

From Berlin to Bonn

Panse gained the formal qualification for a professorship (habilitation) in January 1936 without the usual procedure of submitting a professoral thesis.[1] His former Berlin colleague Kurt Pohlisch (1893-1955), then chair of psychiatry and neurology at Bonn University, had convinced him to come to Bonn (Pohlisch 1935/36: 19–28), where he assumed the post of director of a research institute for psychiatric and neurological genetics. In Mai 1937, Panse was appointed a lecturer of psychiatry and neurology at Bonn University – albeit later than initially planned since he first had to attend an ideological training camp. He was awarded a full teaching assignment in July 1937 and appointed associate professor in 1942.

 

Having served only as a private during WW1, Panse now underwent training to become an assistant physician in the military reserve force. At the end of WW2, he was a medical staff officer in the rank of a lieutenant colonel at the military reserve hospital in Porz-Ensen near Cologne and bore several medals of war. His Nazi party career was rather undistinguished. A supporter of national conservative parties during the final days of the Weimar Republic, he had neither been affiliated with the early Nazi movement nor did he, like so many others, join the Nazi party right after Hitler’s rise to power in 1933. However, he later deemed it opportune to become a member of the NSDAP (membership no.5616924, registered on 1 April 1937). Furthermore, he was a member of the following organisations: National Socialist German Lecturers’ League, National Socialist German Medical Association (since January 1936, membership number 12810), National Air Raid Protection League (since 1933), National Socialist People’s Welfare (since 1933), National Civil Service Federation (since January 1936), Reich Colonial League (since 1936) and German Red Cross (since September 1939). This long list of memberships was not uncommon for a civil service physician who had not fundamentally opposed the Nazi regime. The same holds true for accepting financial support from the SS, which Panse evidentially did in 1934 and 1935.

 

His acquaintance with Kurt Pohlisch proved important for Panse’s professional career. Pohlisch, a protegé of Ernst Rüdin, had been appointed to Bonn University in 1934 despite opposition from the medical faculty and wanted to have a trusted colleague for joint research in the fields of psychiatry and neurology. Panse, who studied the heritability of neurological diseases (e.g., Chorea Huntington) and related issues, seemed a suitable candidate; so Pohlisch managed to place him as the medical director of the Bonn-based research institute for psychiatric and neurological genetics (DGPPN 2011). This position usually would have entailed a university teaching position, but in Panse’s case, the process of institutional integration was rather slow. A simple teaching assignment was issued in 1937, yet Pohlisch failed to secure a full university chair for his colleague. In his three-and-a-half page formal request, Pohlisch repeatedly emphasised that Panse’s (and his own) research and teaching were in close accordance with the guidelines set by the Nazi state. Full of praise, he listed Panse’s achievements:

“Contribution to courses on racial hygiene for public health officers in Bonn and Kreuznach and regularly at the University Institute for Genetics and Racial Hygiene in Frankfurt (under Freiherr von Verschuer). Establishment of close cooperation between the Bonn and Frankfurt institutes. Frequent lectures on racial hygiene at Ordensburg Vogelsang [an educational centre for Nazi leaders], for the National Socialist German Lecturers’ League, the National Socialist People's Welfare [...]; close cooperation with the Gau branches of the Office of Racial Policy in the Rhine Province, especially in the Cologne-Aachen Gau. Continuous contribution to the mandatory advanced training courses for physicians, to university courses for foreign students, to courses at the Middle Rhine Academy for Public Administration, to courses for student law clerks at the State Court in Bonn and regular lectures for welfare workers. Supervisor of a working group of medical students in the German Students’ League in Bonn. Since summer 1938: renewed assignment at the State Academy of Public Health Services in Berlin as a lecturer on psychiatric issues in racial hygiene”[2] [our translation].

 

Whether or not Panse had initially harboured a sceptical attitude toward Nazism, he seems to have fully overcome all reluctance in 1935 at the latest. He revealed his approval of the 1934 Law for the Prevention of Heriditarily Diseased Offspring while still in Berlin. Early in 1935, he was appointed to the Higher Genetic Health Court [Erbgesundheitsobergericht] in Berlin which had the final jurisdiction over appeals against sterilisation orders issued by a lower authority. In 1936, after his transfer to Bonn, he assumed the same position in Cologne. Pohlisch explicitly referred to Panse’s experience in this field: “Extensive activities as an advisor to medical officers, Genetic Health Courts and Higher Genetic Health Courts throughout the Rhine Province in assessing difficult cases of genetic health. Persons or authorities in charge of such cases frequently turn to the Institute […] for advice, and Panse handles the issue in a way that basically provides for uniform jurisdiction on genetic health questions” [our translation].[3] Pohlisch further mentioned Panse’s role in assessing the eligibility of families with many children for special support, which also depended on the selected families’ suitability in terms of “racial hygiene”. The medical faculty then also supported the request that Panse be awarded his own chair, and so did Wilhelm Busch, the leader of the Bonn branch of the National Socialist German Lecturers’ League, who stated that Panse was “a staunch supporter of the Third Reich” [our translation].[4]

 

When it became known that personalised university chairs were to be abolished, the medical faculty considered awarding Panse a regular professorship. The request for an honorary professorship was rejected, and in December 1940, the chairman of the university’s board of trustees informed the rector that the plan to establish a chair of genetics and racial hygiene (for Panse) had to be postponed due to the war. In view of the existing teaching assignment, the matter was considered “not urgent”.[5] Friedrich Tiemann (1899-1982), then dean of the medical faculty, had long argued that Bonn University needed a chair of racial hygiene to be on par with the University of Cologne – but for the time being, this plan had failed.[6] One reason might have been that Panse “bluntly” rejected close personal and institutional cooperation with the Office of Racial Policy Cologne-Aachen, as was later confirmed by several witnesses during his denazification trial. However, this was probably due to scientific rather than political motives.[7] Despite all ideological conformity, Panse was interested in research for the sake of advancing knowledge rather than merely seeking to confirm Nazi ideas.

 

“Pansing” – electroshock treatment during WW2

Friedrich Panse was one of the few scientists whose surname became famous – and infamous – in the form of a verb. While serving at the military reserve hospital in Porz-Ensen near Bonn during WW2, he developed a form of electroshock treatment for traumatised soldiers, which soon became known as “Pansen” [“pansing”]. His assistant Günter Elsässer (1907–1999) wrote that this method of combining high-voltage pulsed galvanic current with “suggestive influencing” was meant to “eliminate psychogenic disorders” (on Elsässer, see Forsbach 2006: 221 ff.).[8] The purpose of this most questionable procedure was to identify patients who only feigned symptoms of traumatisation in order to avoid further military service and, at the same time, heal those who really suffered from “war neurosis”. Being the medical director of the reserve hospital, Panse masterminded this operation, but others were also involved, among them his assistant Günter Elsässer and his Bonn colleague Kurt Pohlisch (the latter in his function of supervising psychiatric consultant of the military district). “Pansing” was a modification of the so-called “Kaufmann method” using Faradaic current that had been applied for similar purposes during WW1, sometimes with lethal effect (cf. Hofer 2000: 67 ff; Hofer 2000a: 262 ff.). However, “pansing” cannot and should not be regarded as a more humane form of treatment. According to Roth (1999: 42), Panse developed the Ensen hospital into a “centre of neuropsychiatric experimentation with modified forms of the classical aversion therapy torture […] in the guise of science- and fact-based healing” [ our translation].

 

Nobody could have claimed that they just followed military orders: the Wehrmacht initially permitted treatment by “pansing” only within narrow limits, and the technique was not part of its list of approved treatments. Many of the army psychiatrists, however, chose to ignore the military command’s careful restraint. Kurt Pohlisch also advocated the use of shock therapy. In July 1941, he wrote in a letter to Otto Wuth, the most senior-ranking military psychiatrist, that “heroic times demand heroic or at least drastic actions” (quoted after Roth 1999: 52; our translation). By the end of 1942, with the war situation dramatically deteriorating, the hardliners around Panse and Pohlisch finally gained the upper hand. “Pansing” became generally permitted on 12 December 1942, which meant that the consent of the patient in question was no longer required. In a lecture held at a working conference of consultant physicians in May 1943, Panse once again campaigned for his method, attributing its “success” to not distinguishing between patients with organic diseases, real neurotics and malingerers: “They [patients with psychogenic disorders] are treated like those with organic illnesses and placed among them. In this way, we can avoid resentment and mistrust, which only obstruct therapy and are entirely unbeneficial. […] The boundaries between some hysterical reactions and deliberate simulation are blurred; exact evidence of the latter is usually difficult to find. We therefore do not concern ourselves with differentiation – except for some rarely occurring dramatic cases – but subject all cases to vigorous treatment. With equal success” (quoted after Roth 1999: 62; our translation). Despite opposition from parts of the Wehrmacht and some Nazi leaders who would have preferred psychotherapy, Panse’s method of applying galvanic current soon became widespread practice. Only air force hospitals never resorted to “pansing”. Even a documentary film was made to convince those who still harboured doubts, perhaps including Hitler himself. Electroshock treatment was also not uncommon in civilian institutions, as confirmed by the former director of the mental hospital in Bonn, Josef Geller, who told the investigating authority that it was “occasionally” used to treat “criminal psychopaths [...] but always on strict medical indication.”[9]

 

Academic teaching

In July 1933, the medical school at Bonn University demanded that an unpaid teaching assignment in “public health and applied eugenics” be issued to associate professor Dr. Walter Blumenberg (1895-1968), a former student of Hugo Selter (1878-1952), the then director of the university's institute of hygiene.[10] A teaching assignment explicitly dealing with “racial hygiene” was first issued for the winter term 1937/38. The assigned lecturer was Friedrich Panse. He held his classes on racial hygiene until the end of the Nazi regime in 1945.

 

His lecture on Human Genetics as the Basis of Racial Hygiene, an optional offer that he first read during the summer term 1939, had around 40 participants and was considered a success.[11] The class on Racial Hygiene was attended by 30 to 40 students, mainly non-medics.[12] Although attendance of Panse’s classes remained fairly stable during the war years, the figures were relatively small compared to courses in botanical and zoological genetics with around 200 students.[13] Panse himself suggested that some of his lectures be incorporated into the training programme for technical staff dealing with applied genetics.

 

In an explanatory statement written after the fall of the Nazi regime, Panse strongly emphasised the scientific nature of his academic teaching. He argued that the content of his teaching had been determined by both his assignment and the institute’s general orientation, that he “read genetics and racial hygiene with a purely clinical focus” and that he rarely addressed anthropological issues since he was no expert in this field and did not support National Socialist theories on race.[14] Several former participants later confirmed that his classes had been “strictly scientific”.[15] The 1936 volume Erbfragen bei Geisteskranken [The question of heritability in mentally diseased persons], written based on lectures held in Berlin, provides us with a clearer picture of Panse’s thinking. Despite underlining the preliminary nature of his research findings time and again (Panse 1936: 5, 69), he never fully rejected the idea of “eradication” but argued for it being restricted to “psychopaths” who displayed “clearly negative types of personality and character” (1936: 69). He firmly advocated forced sterilisation: “alcoholism in women should almost always be considered an indication for sterilisation” (1936: 68). And he demanded that the Hereditary Health Courts take stricter action in cases of Chorea Huntington.

 

Early in 1940, Panse argued that “racial hygiene” should become an exam subject (as was already the case at the universities of Cologne and Frankfurt) and supported this by stating that, in the long run, he could only fully fulfil his teaching assignment if there was a mandatory exam.[16] However, when there were vacancies in Munich and Königsberg in 1944, the Reich Ministry of Education noted that Panse was “first and foremost a psychiatrist” and therefore “probably unsuited for a university chair in racial biology”.[17]

 

Decisions over life and death

Between May and December 1940, Friedrich Panse was one of the expert consultants involved in the so-called “Action T4” (the killing of psychiatric patients) alongside his mentor, Kurt Pohlisch. According to their own accounts, they assessed around 1,000 patient files from psychiatric institutions in Silesia and Austria, with some 600 cases being handled by Panse and 400 by Pohlisch, who later spoke of 1–2% of cases in which he recommended that the patient be killed. The actual rate, however, was higher. Despite the prosecutor’s far more cautious estimate, the Regional Court in Düsseldorf assumed that Pohlisch had recommended the killing of ten patients and Panse that of 15 patients. Nevertheless, they apparently failed to meet the expectations of the “Action T4” headquarters in Berlin – which probably was the reason why their involvement ended at the turn of the year 1940/41 and their names were taken off the list of consultants working outside the six extermination centres (cf. Forsbach 2006: 493).

 

Post-war career

Friedrich Panse managed to continue his university career after the fall of the Nazi regime. Despite his involvement as an “Action T4” expert consultant, his Nazi party membership and his dedicated lectures on racial hygiene, there were enough people ready and willing to exonerate him. Critical voices, such as that of Ernst Derra (1901-1979), a surgeon and Nazi opponent, remained an exception. Derra stated that Panse’s views on eugenics and racial hygiene “seemed largely consistent with the positions propagated by the regime, but [that he had] actually never managed to find out to what extent [Panse] really supported the idea of euthanasia.” Derra also remembered conversations with Panse during which the latter voiced his approval of Nazism and Nazi militarism, even though he was said to have been “not totally uncritical” of the regime.[18] However, this criticism must have been rather harmless, as several “white-washing” testimonials suggest: Panse allegedly felt “regret” about the fate of “Jewish friends and colleagues”, “disapproved of the methods of the civil administration” in Luxemburg, always remained a member of the Protestant Church and never obstructed church activities.[19] Also cited as exculpatory evidence were legal proceedings initiated against Panse early in the Nazi era when he was accused of “a crime against German blood” for vaccinating a German patient with blood taken from a Jewish patient to treat malaria.[20] Panse himself mentioned disciplinary actions taken against him for attending the funeral of his “long-term Jewish supervisor” Emil Bratz (1868-1934) and for his “appreciative obituary”.[21] In fact, said obituary first and foremost acknowledged the deceased colleague’s “commitment to the training of suitable young psychiatrists, who are absolutely indispensable in implementing the eugenic demands of the state.”[22]

 

A former inmate of Buchenwald concentration camp testified that Panse had saved him from being executed by, “albeit reluctantly”[23], declaring him mentally insane despite having noticed that his symptoms of mental derangement were only feigned. Other testimonials also indicate that Panse was, at least to some extent, willing to make false diagnoses in favour of Nazi opponents. He was even said to have made sure that soldiers diagnosed with mental disorder did not face “euthanasia” measures: he apparently reminded colleagues whom he deemed trustworthy that, for members of the Wehrmacht, an assessment suggesting psychiatric institutionalisation came close to a death sentence. Statements of this kind proved highly valuable in exonerating Panse. Furthermore, he was never among those who later indignantly denied all involvement with the Nazis. Emphasising his mixed attitude towards the regime, he explained that he had felt appalled by the events of the Night of Broken Glass in November 1938 and disapproved of Nazi foreign policy but, at the same time, “openly welcomed” eugenic measures for the welfare of the German people.[24] Later, during the war, his “oath of allegiance” meant that he had to abstain from making critical remarks outside his most trusted circle.[25]

 

The main incriminating detail, however, was his involvement in the Action T4 euthanasia programme. He also attended the first workgroup meeting on organising this scheme in mental institutions, which took place in Berlin in April 1940. The Bonn physician Curt Schmidt, who had been invited by mistake and soon left the consultations, later recalled that Panse had voiced his objections during the official meeting. In 1945, the latter extensively described his (professed or real) moral dilemma, explaining that he had “suffered incredibly” and asked himself “time and again” if he “did right when [he] agreed to participate” in the panel of experts or whether it “would have been better to refuse outright” since it was “perfectly clear” that the “brutal approach [was] ethically unjustifiable, abhorrent and detestable.”[26] He claimed that he had asked himself at the time if it was right to accept being eliminated from the list of T4 experts because his further involvement “could have saved more diseased persons”. He ends his five-page reflections on “euthanasia” in the Third Reich with a clear statement: “At any rate, this was the gloomiest chapter in the history of German psychiatry, doing tremendous damage to its reputation, and it was a devastating blow to medical morale. I was aware of this from the first minute of knowing about this issue. Today, I am convinced that in the given situation I did everything to save as many of the diseased as I possibly could under those circumstances. […] My conscience in this difficult matter is absolutely clear.”[27]

 

Having examined all the arguments presented, the internal commission of inquiry at Bonn University acknowledged Panse’s “conscientious considerations” with regard to his involvement in Nazi euthanasia but still came to the conclusion that he was “intolerable” as a university teacher.[28] The Düsseldorf Jury Court, however, followed Panse’s argument of a collision of duties and acquitted him of the charge of crimes against humanity on 24 November 1948. The verdict was confirmed by the Cologne Court of Appeals on 23 July 1949. Exonerated by the courts, Panse was appointed director of the state clinic for brain injuries in Langenberg in 1950. But in February 1952, the North Rhine-Westphalian state government nevertheless refused to authorise his further employment as an assistant professor. Panse brought an action against this decision before the State Administrative Court in Düsseldorf and won the case (cf. Forsbach 2006: 629 ff.). He also resumed his extensive publishing activities (remarkably, his international historical review of the psychiatric hospital system [Das psychiatrische Krankenhauswesen, 1964] is void of any reference to the years 1933-1945).

 

It did not take long before Panse also managed to continue his university career, even though the state government still raised objections. Between 1954 and 1967, he acted as the director of the state clinic in Düsseldorf-Grafenberg and held the chair of psychiatry at the local university. In Grafenberg, he realised several building projects including a new in-patient clinic. Soon a well-renowned professor, he was elected president of the German Society for Psychiatry and Neurology in 1965/66. Policymakers now also seemed to have forgotten or forgiven his past: the Federal Ministry of Labour appointed him to the medical expert council on questions of war victims’ welfare. Panse retired in 1967 but still acted as a psychiatric expert in the trial against the serial killer Jürgen Bartsch (cf. Brückweh 2006: 215 ff.). In 1972, the German Society for Psychiatry and Neurology awarded him honorary membership. Friedrich Panse died on 6 December 1973 in Bochum.

 

The German Society of Psychiatry and Neurology revoked Panse’s honorary membership in 2011, arguing that his “involvement in selecting euthanasia victims” constituted a “complicity in genocide” (DGPPN 2011, our translation).

 

Literature

Brückweh, K. (2006): Mordlust. Serienmorde, Gewalt und Emotionen im 20. Jahrhundert. Frankfurt am Main, New York: Campus.

DGPPN – Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychiatrie, Psychotherapie und Nervenheilkunde (2011): Beschluss zur Aberkennung der Ehrenmitgliedschaften vom 24. November 2011 im Rahmen der DGPPN-Mitgliederversammlung. Berlin. URL: https://www.dgppn.de/fileadmin/user_upload/_medien/dokumente/mitgliederversammlungen/mv2011/2011-11-24-beschluss-ehrenmitgliedschaften.pdf [last access: 09/04/2017].

Forsbach, R. (2006): Die Medizinische Fakultät der Universität Bonn im “Dritten Reich”. Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag.

Forsbach, R. (2012): Friedrich Panse – etabliert in allen Systemen. Psychiater in der Weimarer Republik, im “Dritten Reich” und in der Bundesrepublik. In: Der Nervenarzt 83, pp. 329-336.

Heyll, U. (1997): Friedrich Panse und die psychiatrische Erbforschung. In: M.G. Esch (ed.): Die Medizinische Akademie Düsseldorf im Nationalsozialismus. Essen: Klartext-Verlag, pp. 318-340.

Hofer, G. (2000): “Nervöse Zitterer”, Psychiatrie und Krieg. In: K. Helmut (ed.): Krieg, Medizin und Politik. Der Erste Weltkrieg und die österreichische Moderne. Vienna: Passagen-Verlag, pp. 15-134.

Hofer, G. (2000a): Nerven-Korrekturen. Ärzte, Soldaten und die “Kriegsneurosen” im Ersten Weltkrieg. In: Zeitgeschichte 27 (4), pp. 249-268.

Kaminsky, U. (1995): Zwangssterilisation und “Euthanasie” im Rheinland. Evangelische Erziehungsanstalten sowie Heil- und Pflegeanstalten 1933-1945. Cologne: Rheinland-Verlag.

Lerner, P. (2003): Hysterical men. War, psychiatry, and the politics of trauma in Germany, 1890-1930. Ithaca, London: Cornell University Press.

Meusch, M. (2008): Der Düsseldorfer “Euthanasie”-Prozess und die juristische Exkulpation von NS-Tätern. In: B. Böhm, G. Hacke (eds.): Fundamentale Gebote der Sittlichkeit. Der “Euthanasie”-Prozess vor dem Landgericht Dresden 1947. Dresden: Sandstein, pp. 172-189.

Neuner, S. (2011): Politik und Psychiatrie. Die staatliche Versorgung psychisch Kriegsbeschädigter in Deutschland 1920-1939. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

Panse, F. (1925): Das Schicksal von Renten- und Kriegsneurotikern in seiner Abhängigkeit von Begutachtung und Umwelteinflüssen. In: Deutsche Zeitschrift für Nervenheilkunde 88, pp. 232-237.

Panse, F. (1926): Das Schicksal von Renten- und Kriegsneurotikern nach Erlangung ihrer Ansprüche. In: Archiv für Psychiatrie 77, pp. 61-92.

Panse, F. (1927): Eröffnung der Nervenklinik Wiesengrund der Wittenauer Heilstätten der Stadt Berlin. In: Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie 86, pp. 395-397.

Panse, F. (1930): Die Schädigungen des Nervensystems durch technische Elektrizität. Mit Bemerkungen über den Tod durch Elektrizität. Berlin: Karger.

Panse, F. (1934): Nekrolog Bratz. In: Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie und psychisch-gerichtliche Medizin 102, pp. 370-374.

Panse, F. (1936): Erbfragen bei Geisteskrankheiten. Nach Vorträgen an der Staatsmedizinischen Akademie Berlin. Leipzig: Barth.

Panse, F. (1941): Das Erb- und Erscheinungsbild der Psychopathen. Bonn: Scheur.

Panse, F. (1952): Angst und Schreck in klinisch-psychologischer und sozialmedizinischer Sicht. Dargestellt an Hand von Erlebnisberichten aus dem Luftkrieg. Stuttgart: Thieme.

Panse, F. (1959): Bundesgesetze und Leistungen für die durch Krieg und Kriegsfolgen Geschädigten. Mainz-Gonsenheim: Deutscher Fachschriften-Verlag Braun.

Panse, F. (1960): Klinische Psychologie, ein psychiatrisches Bedürfnis. Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag.

Panse, F. (1964): Das psychiatrische Krankenhauswesen. Entwicklung, Stand, Reichweite und Zukunft. Stuttgart: Thieme.

Panse, F., H. J. Schmidt (1967): Pieter Bruegels Dulle Griet. Bildnis einer psychisch Kranken. Leverkusen: Bayer.

Panse, F. (1968): Zur ursächlichen Bedeutung exogener Faktoren für die Entstehung und den Verlauf der Schizophrenie. Stuttgart, Cologne: Kohlhammer.

Panse, F., K. Czechmanek, H. Mücher (1972): Hirnverletztenschicksale. Dargestellt an Offen-Hirnverletzten des 1. Weltkrieges 1914/18. Stuttgart: Thieme.

Pohlisch K., F. Panse (1934): Schlafmittelmissbrauch. Leipzig: Thieme.

Pohlisch, K. (1935/36): Das Rheinische Provinzial-Institut für psychiatrisch-neurologische Erbforschung in Bonn. In: Bonner Mitteilun­gen 15, pp. 19-28.

Rauh, P., L. Prüll (2015): Krank durch den Krieg? Der Umgang mit psychisch kranken Veteranen in Deutschland in der Zeit der Weltkriege. In: Portal Militärgeschichte, 24. June 2015, URL: http://portal-militaergeschichte.de/rauh_pruell_krank [last access: 08/22/2016].

Riedesser, P., A. Verderber (1996): Maschinengewehre hinter der Front. Zur Geschichte der deutschen Militärpsychiatrie. Frankfurt am Main: Fischer.

Roth, K. H. (1987): Die Modernisierung der Folter in den beiden Weltkriegen. Der Konflikt der Psychotherapeuten und Schulpsychiater und die deutschen “Kriegsneurotiker” 1915-1919. In: 1999 2 (3), pp. 8-75.

 

Archival Sources

[1] Universitätsarchiv (UA) Bonn, PA 6782 Panse; ibid., MF-PA 110 Panse; Landesarchiv (LA) Nordrhein-Westfalen Duisburg, NW 1049-49526.

[2] UA Bonn, PA 6782, Pohlisch to Dean MF, 05/09/1939.

[3] UA Bonn, PA 6782, Pohlisch to Dean MF, 05/09/1939.

[4] UA Bonn, MF-PA 110 Panse, Dean to Siebke to Minister of Education via Leader of the National Socialist German Lecturers’ Association, Rector and Chairman of the Board of Trustees, 05/12/1939; ibid., PA 6782 Panse, Leader of the Lecturers’ Association W. Busch to Rector, 05/22/1939.

[5] UA Bonn, MF-PA 110 Panse, Dean Tiemann to Ministry of Education, 03/18/1940; ibid., PA 6782 Panse, Chairman Ehrlicher to Rector, 12/18/1940; ibid., Klingelhöfer/Ministry of Education to Chairman, 06/20/1940 (copied on 06/25/1940).

[6] UA Bonn, MF-PA 110 Panse, Tiemann to Faculty, 07/16/1940 (cf. Forsbach 2006, pp. 215).

[7] UA Bonn, PA 6782, “Meine Stellung zur Rassenhygiene in Lehre und Forschung” [My attitude towards racial hygiene in teaching and research], 09/08/1945.

[8] UA Bonn, PA 1730 Elsäßer, CV, 10/04/1943.

[9] LA Duisburg, NW 1049-48516, report by Geller, 06/08/1945 (copy).

[10] Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz (GStA PK) Berlin, Rep. 76, V a, Selt. 3, Tit. IV. No. 39, Vol. XVI, Chairman Proske to Ministry of Education, 07/28/1933; see also: UA Bonn, MF 79/105.

[11] UA Bonn, PA 6782, Pohlisch to Dean MF, 05/09/1939.

[12] UA Bonn, PA 6782, Pohlisch to Dean MF, 05/09/1939.

[13] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, Ebbecke to Dean MF, 06/07/1943.

[14] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, “Meine Stellung zur Rassenhygiene in Lehre und Forschung”, 09/08/1945.

[15] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, testimony by Karl-Otto Vorlaender, 10/04/1945.

[16] UA Bonn, MF-PA 110 Panse, Panse to Pohlisch [?], 03/26/1940; see also: ibid., Panse to Pohlisch [?], 04/16/1940.

[17] Bundesarchiv (BA) Berlin, R 4901 (previously R 21), No. 477, note to Kuhnert, 02/15/1944.

[18] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, report by Derra, 09/06/1945.

[19] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, report by Laubenthal, 09/08/1945; see also: ibid., testimony by Hillert, 09/08/1945 (also in: LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526); UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, report by Schnitzler, 11/05/1945; LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526, Creutzfeldt to Commission of Inquiry at Bonn University, 11/08/1945.

[20] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, report by Laubenthal, 09/08/1945.

[21] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, report by Laubenthal, 09/08/1945.

[22] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, “Meine Stellung zum Nationalsozialismus” [My attitude towards national socialism], 09/08/1945 (in: LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526, dated 04/14/1947); ibid., assessment by Weber/von Redwitz/Ceelen, Commission of Inquiry at Bonn University, 10/12/1945; see also: Panse (1934), pp. 370-374.

[23] LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526, affidavit by Joseph Diefenthal, 04/08/1947.

[24] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, “Meine Stellung zum Nationalsozialismus”, 09/08/1945 (in: LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526, dated 04/14/1947).

[25] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, “Meine Stellung zum Nationalsozialismus”, 09/08/1945 (in: LA Duisburg, NW 1049-49526, dated 04/14/1947).

[26] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, on the question of the so-called “Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens” [Elimination of life unworthy of life], 09/08/1945.

[27] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, on the question of the so-called “Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens”, 09/08/1945; see also: LA Duisburg, NW 1049-48516, Panse, “Die deut­sche Psychiatrie und die Euthanasie” [German psychiatry and euthanasia], 10/29/1946.

[28] UA Bonn, PA 6782 Panse, assessment by Weber/von Redwitz/Ceelen, Commission of Inquiry at Bonn University, 10/12/1945.

 

Ralf Forsbach

 

This article is an extended and translated version of a text first published on Portal Rheinische Geschichte.

 

Picture: Portrait of Friedrich Panse (1940); Archiv Arbeitskreis Psychiatriegeschichte (APG-Bonn), Psychiatriemuseum LVR-Klinik Bonn; copyright.